Weighing In
by SnowStormSkies
Summary: When Mycroft Holmes offers John Watson an unnamed sum of money to spy on Sherlock, every part of John weighs in, in the space of a split second. Can be read as prequel sort of to my other fic, A Mad Existence Still Needs Payment. No Pairings.


**Title:** Weighing In

**Author: **SnowStormSkies

**Universe: **Sherlock

**Theme/Topic: **On the idea of what went through John Watson's head when Mycroft offered him money.

**Rating: **T+. Some graphic imagery and language.

**Characters: **Mostly John, Mycroft and a brief mention of Sherlock.

**Warnings/Spoilers: **First half an hour of the first episode. Maybe.

**Word Count: **1047 words.

**Time: **About a week to hash it all out and get it all straight.

**Summary: **When Mycroft Holmes offers John Watson an unnamed sum of money to spy on Sherlock, every part of John weighs in, in the space of a split second. Can be read as prequel sort of to my other fic, _A Mad Existence Still Needs Payment._

**Dedication: **Dedicated to the wonderful writers of the first episode. God, it was good... I don't know that I can make it another year without it.

**A/N: **Umm, not too much to say here. I've been working on a lot of stuff over the last two or three months, trying to pull everything together. NaNoWriMo is looming, but you should be getting a deluge of fic for Christmas... Yeah, I'm really not convincing anyone here, am I? As for John's rank and unit and stuff, I haven't a fucking clue. I don't even know if his rank still exists anymore, and as for the regiment – I can't find any references. If anyone wants to correct me, I'd be happy to change it, but until then, it'll have to stay. As for his time in Afghanistan, let's just call it artistic license - I see his role rather like they did in M*A*S*H - they were the first line of defense between Soliders and Death. I like to think so anyway.

**Distribution: **Neyt. No. Non. Not a chance. My lj and that's it.

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**Weighing In**

**...**

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When Mycroft offers him money to spy on Sherlock, to pass along information about his habits, his life, his everything, in the space of a split second, every part of John weighs in what he should do.

Doctor J.D Watson, the medical man, declines out of a sense of honour and faith to his oath - the Hippocratic Oath, for him at least, extends to more than just his patients. He might have confessed all about Harry to Sherlock, but really, the man just figured it out for himself and John just corrected his biggest assumption of all. Doctor Watson has honour, pride and faith in himself to hold to that Oath, and he won't break it for _any_ sum of money.

John Watson wants to accept – as the realist within, he knows his army pension is a pittance, his invalid pay spent on a therapist that isn't working and a miniscule flat in a rundown non-descript area of London. His savings, never fantastic are so depleted as to be almost gone and though he's not too proud to accept government benefits, according to them, he's too rich to be poor. He's skipping meals to make ends meet, cutting ruthlessly down to one session a week with his therapist because even at fifty pounds a session, she still wants him to be attending the recommended three a week. There's not enough flex in his bank account for a new pair of bloody socks, never mind a hundred and fifty pounds on therapy that's not working. His leg burns in agony, and more than enough times, he's thought about giving in but he won't take a taxi or a bus for anything less than five miles – though when does he actually travel that far? John Watson, the realist, knows how much he needs the money and will accept whatever, the cost.

Afghanistan, Solider - case 1061, invalided home with a wound to left shoulder, right knee and suspected PTSD wants to refuse but will accept because he's more than a realist – he's a **_survivor_**. When choosing between chronic absolute poverty, a cold empty flat, no food and an ever decreasing social circle, and a sum of regular income, fuck the consequences, the survivor will hang on come hell or high water. He's ready to rise again, wants to _live_ not just exist.

Captain John H. Watson of the Army, of the 4th Medical Regiment , attached to the 12th Mechanised Brigade wants to accept as well, but won't. Not out the honour of a doctor, holding the value of an oath over his own comfort and health. This part of John won't accept out of _pride_; he'll make his own way in life, thank you very much. He's twenty seven years old, a war hero and a doctor – a bloody good one on both accounts, as he considers himself to be. He'll find his own back to civilisation, he wants to assure Mycroft, after all, he's managed it since he was seven and his mother's drinking finds its sneaky, sly evil little way into his bed and his mind. For twenty years he's coped with everything as it comes, and he can damn well carry on in the same fashion now, he feels like shouting at Mycroft.

Doc Watson, the old happy graduate of his past, the genial army doctor in training that most of his dwindling friends remember but don't see any more doesn't pass judgement. He's been silent for so very long now, so many days and weeks, and hours and months and years of silence.

Cold, lonely _silence_.

Since his first arrival to take his turn out in the desert of Afghanistan, his first foray into the darkest side of humanity, Doc Watson has been so very very quiet. Since that first bitter night when the Hercules landed and twenty doctors staggered off the plane and fifty soldiers clawed their way back out of the hell of Afghanistan, dragging themselves up the ramp onto that plane and screamed for take-off and safety, begged for family and home and rains of water, not bullets and rubble and bloody bodies – since that night, Doc Watson won't speak to anyone.

It was his first glimpse into a bloody war time operating room, soldiers howling like the undead for pain relief and last rites while they waited for a table in an operating room already overcrowded and understaffed. The triage room was five deep, and twenty nurses short, and the air was thick with death and pain and ghosts of those who had died before they be reached. Blood splattered walls from arterial spray, piles of red smeared instruments of butchery piled high on tables, white gauze wrapped around wounds already oozing blood and plasma and guts and death quicker than the drips could replace them. Doc Watson is twenty five and he's arrived in a war, shrapnel victims ready for him, bloody human carcasses on the table waiting for him to glove up and go feeling around in chest cavities for a heart that doesn't beat anymore. Doc Watson hasn't spoken in so long now because his mouth is full of bodies and bloody surgical instruments, and guns and spent rounds and suicide bombers screaming in a language he has learnt to hate with a blinding rage.

Doc Watson, the fresh young graduate just looks at Mycroft with eyes of dying soldiers and _why did they make me live?_ and stitched up wounds that leak gangrene and shame and bloody tears and doesn't speak at all.

John Watson, the man introduce to Sherlock yesterday afternoon, is very firmly in the camp of **_not interested_** – out of a strange loyalty to a man he knows very little about, and a determined sense of that even Mycroft is dangerous, Sherlock is both more and less so at the same time. He's not exactly doing this for Sherlock, but more out of a sense of hating manipulation on any level. He's done enough spying and following orders and doing things he doesn't want to do, and he's not looking for anymore. This unnamed man is just pissing him off by trying.

Anger - true, geniune anger rather than just annoyance - courses through his veins and he grits his teeth.

_"...I'm just not interested..."_

Not in anything from this man, anyway.

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**_Umm, not much to say really. This could be seen as the prequel to A Mad Existence... but it's entirely up to you; it wasn't written to be that way. WACIB and BSP to be edited and updated tomorrow sometime. _**

**_Have a good evening! _**


End file.
